


if you only love me

by sasofy



Category: Infinite (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Childhood Friends, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-23
Updated: 2016-12-23
Packaged: 2018-09-07 07:11:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8788573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sasofy/pseuds/sasofy
Summary: As much as he does not want to talk about it, as much as he wants to push him and everything related to that time in his life away forever, Sungjong knows that he can't. He's already run away long enough.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [heartcools (bluedreaming)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluedreaming/gifts).



The hand wrapping the bandages around Sungjong's is surprisingly gentle, the fingers moving skillfully, almost imperceptibly around the wound. Sungjong guesses it comes from experience, yet he hadn't expected the loud, bubbly girl in front of him to be this delicate.

"I'm quite good, huh? The patients say I have magic fingers," she says as if reading Sungjong's mind, finally interrupting the stream of chatter she has been flooding him and Myungsoo with since they walked into the hospital room, earlier. Sungjong is kind of glad: Myungsoo was already nervous enough, he certainly didn't need to hear the girl's stories of chopped fingers and reattachment surgeries gone wrong, made even more sinister by the friendly smile and cheerful tone they were told with, as if they were not gory and upsetting but normal everyday occurrences. Which may very well be the case for an emergency room doctor, too.

"I'm almost done," the girl says, reaching out behind her to grab the clips that will keep the bandages in place. The hold of the tissue around Sungjong's hand tightens as she applies them, and for a moment Sungjong flinches in pain. It's only a small, quiet gasp, he thinks, but Myungsoo's high-strung nerves catch it right away.

"Are you OK, Jongie?" he asks, all worried eyes and frantic voice, "Does it hurt? Do you want to take something?"

"No, no—it's fine," Sungjong ressures him. "It doesn't hurt, really. Well—only a bit." It really didn't hurt at all before, not even as the blade sunk into the flesh; Sungjong hadn't felt a thing. It's only started now, a dull, throbbing ache, simmering just beneath the surface.

 

 

 

 

It brings Sungjong back in time, to that day.

They were standing at the back of the school yard, the three of them—Sungjong and Myungsoo and Sungyeol, of course—in the most secluded spot where they had the least chances of being spotted by one of the teachers, always on the lookout for Sungyeol, what new shenanigans he might be up to this time. Sungyeol himself was holding a needle, silvery and gleaming, but a speck of light as the afternoon sun reflected off it. Sungjong wondered where he had even gotten it from; Sungyeol had always had knack for conjuring things up out of thin air.

"Do we really have to do it?" Myungsoo's voice, trembling and full of fear. Sungjong remembers looking at him, at his anxious, pale face. Part of him wanted to scoff at Myungsoo—it was just a needle, after all; nothing to be so terrified of—but mostly, he felt bad for him. Myungsoo might be older than him, but Sungjong had always felt protective of him, like he was the hyung in their relationship, and not the other way around.

Looking at him now, Sungjong wondered if he should try to stop Sungyeol, or at least get him to leave Myungsoo out of this. Sungjong himself didn't particularly care either way; he had simply decided to go along with Sungyeol's plan because it was easier than trying to convince him to change his mind, and because that was what he (and Myungsoo) always did: Sungyeol acted, they followed. One way or another.

"Don't be chicken," Sungyeol scoffed. "It's just a needle, it's not like I'm going to pierce your hand through. It will be like a prickle—you'll hardly feel it." Sungyeol waved the needle around, in a way that looked vaguely threatening and did nothing to appease Myungsoo's fear, judging from his increasingly panicked expression. "So who wants to go first?"

Sungjong looked between him and Myungsoo. He could tell from the glint in Sungyeol's eyes that there was little chance of changing his mind. This whole blood pact thing was Sungyeol's most recent obsession, something he had probably picked up from a movie or comic or whatever. When Sungyeol got into these moods of his, there was no stopping him. It would be easier to just let him have his way and get it over with.

"I will," Sungjong said. He snatched the needle out of Sungyeol's hand and pricked his own palm. It was quick, light, yet enough to make a drop of blood appear on the surface. He ignored Sungyeol's protests— _You can't do it yourself! You need to have someone else do it for you, or the ceremony_ —and immediately turned to Myungsoo. "Give me your hand." It would be better if he did it and not Sungyeol, who was as delicate as a bull.

Myungsoo's hand was trembling as Sungjong held it in his. He uncurled the fingers, exposing the soft, sweaty palm, and pricked it as fast as he could.

Sungjong was pretty sure Myungsoo hadn't really felt anything, yet he still gasped at the sight of blood. Sungjong looked at it for a moment, too, fascinated, before Sungyeol's voice snapped him out of it.

"Yah, who's going to do me? Come on, I— _Aaah!"_

Sungjong had just pricked, or better stabbed the palm of his outstretched hand, with probably more force than was necessary. "What was that for?" Sungyeol whined as he cradled his hand.

"Sorry," Sungjong said, not sounding nor feeling very apologetic at all. "You just seemed so eager—"

They all pressed their palms to each other's afterwards; Myungsoo was calmer now, seemingly having realised that he wasn't going to die or bleed out or anything like that. Sungjong was pretty sure there was too little blood for there to be much mixing of anything, yet there was something almost solemn in the sight of their hands pressed together like that.

"It's done," Sungyeol declared in the end, eyes sparkling. "Now we're bound forever. Once three, always three."

 

 

 

 

"It's done," The girl's voice says, pulling Sungjong back to reality, and to the hospital room. "Just change the bandages once a day, and come back in a few week's time to remove the stitches. The wound isn't that deep, there was just a lot of blood. It should heal in no time at all."

Sungjong looks down at his hand, snugly wrapped up in the bandages, white and spotless. No more red seeping through like before. A neat, good job.

"Are you sure?" He remembers Jiae's voice on the other side of the phone, tinged with uncertain. "I mean, I can ring her up, no problem, but—I wouldn't want her to stitch _me_ up."

"Didn't you say she was a doctor?" Sungjong asked doubtfully.

"Yeah," Jiae said, "but she's also an idiot."

Sungjong doesn't know what she was so worried about.

"Thank you so much," he tells the girl as he and Myungsoo put their jackets back on. He glances at her just as he makes for the door, hoping that the sight of her face will give him the inspiration necessary to recall her name. What is it, again? He can never seem to remember it. He blames Jiae for that, she and her habit of calling the girl simply "idiot."

"I can't, got plans with the idiot," she'll say sometimes when Sungjong asks her to hang out; or, turning up her nose, "It's the idiot," whenever Sungjong notices a balled-up shirt on the floor, an unwashed cup in the sink, the only blemishes in Jiae's otherwise pristine flat. "She can't be tidy to save her life." And so Sungjong started calling her "the idiot" between himself, too; he can't quite call her that to her face, though.

"No problem," The Idiot gives them a bright, toothy grin. Sungjong is pretty sure her name starts with "Mi", but he has no idea what comes after that. "Tell Jiae she owes me one." She looks at them from over the threshold, and her grin curls up mischievously. "Have fun tonight, uh? Don't let the hand stop you~"

And with that she waltzes back into the room, door sliding shut behind her.

Sungjong blinks. He looks at Myungsoo, and sees the same wide-eyed, surprised expression on his face.

 

 

 

 

They're still grinning as they stumble out of the lift and into the parking lot. Myungsoo is full-out giggling, body shaking, and Sungjong knows he is faring no better himself. They've laughed their way through and out of the hospital, earning themselves perplexed and at times stern looks from the staff and other patients. Sungjong supposes it's unusual to see people laugh like that in a hospital, and then he immediately feels bad, because there's a reason why that is the case.

But they hadn't been able to help it. It was just so funny—

"I can't believe it," Myungsoo wheezes next to him as they make their way to his car, kind of tripping every two steps and holding his stomach."Why would she think we're a couple or something?"

But even as he laughs, Sungjong thinks that it's not that weird. The signs were all there, after all: two guys alone on Christmas Eve, an accident while making dinner together. No wonder the Idiot jumped to her own conclusions. "Right? I mean, can you imagine it? You and I, _dating?"_

Myungsoo laughs. Then, to Sungjong's surprise, his laugh slowly gives way to a serious, almost wounded expression. "… You don't want to date me?"

"Hyung," Sungjong says, trying to keep himself from laughing again, "it's not that. It's just—you're, like, my _brother!_ I can't see you that way."

Myungsoo blinks, and the disappointment is gone from his face as he starts smiling again. It's perhaps the first time since Sungjong's slip of hand that Myungsoo has looked this relaxed, and Sungjong is glad. "That's true… It's the same for me, too."

"See?"

They're still chatting as they climb into the car—empty, inane but comforting chatter—Myungsoo switching on the engine as Sungjong puts on his seatbelt. Yet for some reason they both grow quiet as Myungsoo starts driving and leaves the parking lot, then the hospital behind.

Sungjong gazes out of the window, even though there's not much to see at this time of the night. The dark, glistening road; a few shop signs still on; the lone flash of another car, from time to time. A soft, watery sort of snow is falling—has been falling ever since he and Myungsoo got to the hospital, yet it hasn't managed to paint the city white yet. It's too flimsy to stick; it will be gone by tomorrow. There's something about it, though, that seems quite fitting. White Christmas, and all that.

The silence filling the car is almost eery, yet it's hardly surprising. It's always like that, when it's only two of them. Like there's something missing, a presence lingering in the air between them, even though he's not there.

 

 

 

 

Sungjong didn't meet Myungsoo first.

He must have been 8 back then—or maybe 9; he can't remember exactly. He was in the library that day, spending break time with his head sunk in a book, as usual. Or at least, pretending to. Sungjong never did much reading at all. It's just that the library was the only place where he could be by himself in peace, without feeling others' eyes on him, judging, or having to watch the other kids play among themselves, and feel, secretly, like a misfit.

Sungjong was a difficult child. His delicate looks had made him victim of teasing ever since he could remember; yet instead of crushing or bending his confidence, that had only inflated it. Sungjong suspected that the source of all the bullying was jealousy, for his uncommonly good looks (even now, he's still convinced of it; you don't see a face like his every day, after all). The realisation made him look at the kids around him with a new set of critical eyes: they all seemed sloppy, dull by comparison. Sungjong had always been particular about what he liked and didn't like, and now he found himself developing a set of strict, refined standards he judged other kids with, even those who approached him first, trying to make friends. No one quite measured up to them, and so most of the time, he was alone.

That day, though, something broke the stillness Sungjong was normally immersed in. A sudden, sweeping sound, like a gush of wind. Sungjong looked up from his book, curious—

—And right into a pair of big, drooping eyes.

Sungjong gasped, jumping off his seat and almost dropping the book. The owner of the sad-looking eyes shushed him right away, non-existent eyebrows furrowed into a frown. _"Ssssh!_ They will find me!"

Sungjong blinked. He looked at the kid. He was standing with his back pressed against the bookshelf beside Sungjong's table—the one that shielded it from the rest of the library and made this Sungjong's favourite place—like he wanted to melt, to disappear into it. And he was so thin that Sungjong wouldn't have been surprised if he had succeeded. Sungjong himself was delicately built, but this guy was something else: the legs and arms sticking out of his school uniform were skinny, stick-like, looking like they were going to break the moment you touched them. His angular body contrasted with the roundness of his face, plump cheeks and full, soft-looking lips.

The kid kept trying to see behind the bookshelf from where he was plastered against it—almost twisting his neck in the process, Sungjong thought—while still keeping a poised stance, like he was ready to run for it if the need arose. Sungjong would have very much liked to simply ignore the guy and go back to his book, but the book was a bore and his curiosity got the best of him.

"… What are you doing?" he whispered.

The guy's eyes flitted to him for a moment, widening slightly, like he'd forgotten Sungjong was there. "What does it look like to you? I'm _hiding!"_

Hiding? "From who?"

"Well, from—"

A sudden, hammering sound, as if someone had just stormed inside the library. The guy jumped up and almost out of his own skin, big eyes growing even wider, even before the shrill voice boomed through the dead quiet of the library.

_"Yah, Lee Sungyeol!"_

And then the kid—Sungyeol—was gone, like breeze, as fast and suddenly as he had first appeared. Sungjong looked at the spot where he had been standing only moments before, blinking, before another guy came stumbling right into it. Unlike Sungyeol, though, he did so ungracefully—making a lot of noise and tripping on his own two feet.

His head snapped up to look at Sungjong once he had finally regained his balance. He was panting, face flushed and small eyes narrowed. Sungjong would later learn that that face belonged to Kim Sunggyu.

They looked into each other's eyes for a moment. The guy made to open his mouth to speak, but then seemed to think better of it and just ran away, as awkwardly as before, the sound of his angered shouts lingering behind him.

_"Sungyeol—"_

The next time was in the library, too.

"What are you doing?"

The voice startled Sungjong—again; Sungyeol seemed to have a talent for that. Because it was Sungyeol of course, looking over Sungjong's shoulder and down at his book with those big, curious eyes. "Reading again?"

Sungjong brushed a hand over the pages, almost defensively. "Why not? I like reading."

"Me too," Sungyeol said, which took Sungjong aback. He hadn't made Sungyeol out to be a bookworm kind of person. "But why would you do that at school, when there's so much fun stuff to do instead?"

"Like what?" Sungjong scoffed. "Getting into trouble the whole time?"

After their first meeting, he had kept an eye out for Sungyeol. It hadn't taken him long to spot him again: Sungyeol stood out easily in a crowd, with his height and loud voice and extravagant ways. And Sungyeol was _always_ in a crowd, surrounded by people: he seemed to be friends with literally everyone in school. Unsurprisingly, he had a reputation for being a troublemaker. As different from him as could be, Sungjong had concluded.

He expected Sungyeol to be offended, annoyed by his remark, but he just looked at him and grinned cheekily. "You know it."

Sungyeol didn't meet Sungjong's standards in any way—if anything, he was the exact opposite of what Sungjong liked; yet his smile was quite nice. The way it brightened his whole face up, showing his gums. "By the way, what's your name, prince?"

Sungjong frowned. "I'm _not_ a prince."

"Well, you look like one," Sungyeol said matter-of-factly. "So what may I call you, Mr Prince?"

Sungjong was about to laugh at this guy's stupidity—and to remind him that he was pretty sure you didn't need to add "Mr" before "prince"—but then he checked himself. All in all, he didn't mind being treated like royalty. "You may call me Sungjong," he conceded.

"Sungjong… " The guy grinned again. "Nice to meet you, prince Sungjongie. I'm Sungyeol." Like Sungjong didn't know that already. "By the way, what is it that you're reading here?"

For some reason, Sungjong felt nervous as Sungyeol peered down at the cover of the book. "Ah, _The Secret Garden_ —I've read this one!"

"Uh."

"Pip's quite cool, isn't he? He's my favourite character."

Sungjong blinked. He hadn't managed to go beyond the first few pages without nodding off, and even then, he could hardly remember anything about the main character other than the fact that she was a girl. "Uh, yeah. He's nice."

"Really." Sungyeol looked up at him, a lop-sided grin spreading on his face. "That's interesting, 'cause I don't think there's a character called Pip in this book."

Sungjong blushed. "W-what—"

"I don't think you really like reading, Sungjongie~"

Sungyeol was faster than the book Sungjong had thrown after him, damn him, the sound of his mocking laughter taunting Sungjong long after he had disappeared behind the bookshelf.

The next time, Sungyeol didn't come alone. There was a boy with him, shorter but more robust than Sungyeol (of course; Sungjong didn't think anyone could possibly be thinner than that). Sungjong couldn't see much of the boy from where he was hiding behind Sungyeol—strands of bushy, unruly black hair and one shy, curious eye peering back at him—but he thought he recognised him from his Sungyeol-watching sessions. The people surrounding Sungyeol always changed, but this guy was the one constant, always clinging to Sungyeol one way or another.

"Myungsoo," Sungyeol introduced him carelessly. "Myungsoo, this is Sungjong. _Prince_ Sungjong."

Sungjong rolled his eyes—the prince thing _again?_ —but he felt Myungsoo's own wide-open eyes on him, staring. "P-p-prince?" he squealed in a surprisingly raspy voice.

"Yeah. That's what I said, isn't it?"

"Like… like a _real_ one?"

"You know it."

Myungsoo was full-out gawking now, apparently having forgotten all about his shyness. "Oh—" he suddenly seemed to recollect himself and bowed, awkwardly, somehow managing to almost trip all over himself in the process. And he hadn't even been walking. "N-n-nice to meet you, prince Sungjong—"

 _"Nice to meet you?"_ Sungyeol was looking down at Myungsoo with one of the most reproaching looks Sungjong had ever seen. Maybe it was the half-eyebrows that made it look particularly stern. _"Only_ nice to meet you? Myungsoo, didn't you hear what I said? He's a prince! He's, like, a _royal!"_

Myungsoo was staring at Sungyeol, mouth gaping and eyes getting wider and wider. "Uh… I… " He looked between Sungyeol and Sungjong, looking quite lost and increasingly worried and unsure of himself as Sungyeol kept spouting his crap.

It was so hilariously adorable that Sungjong forgot about his composure for a moment and burst out laughing, so hard that his stomach hurt, that he was pretty sure he had tears in his eyes. He didn't remember the last time he had laughed like this, but it certainly hadn't been at school. "I'm not a prince," he chuckled when he'd finally managed to stop, "And Sungyeol here is an idiot."

"Yah," Sungyeol huffed, but there was no spite in it. He was probably used to being called such names.

What took Sungjong by surprise, rather, was Myungsoo's reaction. He blinked a few times, eyes unfocused, then turned to look at Sungyeol. "So… it's not true?"

"What?"

"He's not a prince?"

"Myungsoo," Sungyeol rolled his eyes, "That's what we've been saying for the last five minutes. I was just kidding. It was a  _jo—ke."_

That's when it happened. Myungsoo's face started scrunching up as he looked at Sungyeol, like he was about to cry (which should have been unflattering, but he still managed to look cute, somehow). "You… you… you _meanie—"_

And much to Sungjong's amazement he proceeded to launch himself at Sungyeol and hit him any way he could—drumming his balled-up fists against him, kicking at him, scratching him even—in a way that was almost savage for someone who looked so soft and… well, harmless.

Sungjong almost jumped in to stop him—Sungyeol looked so fragile, wouldn't he break under the assault?—but to his surprise, not only didn't Sungyeol seem to be in pain, or even particularly bothered by Myungsoo's outburst. If anything, he seemed to find it the most hilarious thing in the world, at least judging from the way he was roaring with laughter, snorting and whooping even as Myungsoo tried to climb over his back to pull his hair.

All Sungjong could do was stare in astonished silence.

Finally Myungsoo saw Sungjong look—gape—at him, and he froze. He stopped hitting Sungyeol, retreated back into his shy shell. "He's always teasing me," he mumbled, eyes low, as a way of explanation. Sungjong didn't think he needed to give one: from the little he had been able to glimpse of Sungyeol's personality so far, the guy deserved all the hitting he could get.

Sungjong was surprised, later, to find out that Myungsoo was actually one year older than him—the same age as Sungyeol, as it were. Those two were, apparently, the best of friends, which was also a surprise of sorts. In many ways, Myungsoo and Sungyeol were polar opposites, as different as two people could possibly be: Sungyeol was as loud and shameless as Myungsoo was shy and quiet; Myungsoo was a hopeless romantic, all Sungyeol cared about was the food in his belly and how many pranks he had managed to pull last week without being caught. Yet for some reason, they worked together just fine.

And suddenly, Sungjong was included in this comradeship. What had been the Myungsoo-Sungyeol duo was now Myungsoo-Sungyeol-Sungjong. You couldn't get one without the other two coming in tow, kind of like those special offers you can find in supermarkets sometimes—buy one get two. Only that in their case, it was three.

Myungsoo and Sungyeol's friends became also his, by extension; and although there were a few of those people that Sungjong wished he had never met (Woohyun, for example, or Sunggyu, to a lesser degree) it was mostly fun. Sungjong found that he was quite good at mingling with people. He didn't know why he had avoided it so much before.

They did everything together, the three of them, except sleep—and sometimes even that, one of them inviting the other two to his house for a sleepover. Myungsoo and Sungyeol did this often enough, but for Sungjong, it was a first. Soon he got used to legs tangling with his at night, someone drooling on his shoulder, hands trying to steal his popcorns or chips or whatever.

Those years were hardly idyllic, but Sungjong thinks he will always miss them, in a way. A time when everything was so simple between the three of them, when Sungyeol and Myungsoo weren't so much two other people but a sort of extension of himself.

 

 

 

 

Those two were so close, in fact, that Sungjong had always assumed they'd been like that since forever. Shared the same cradle, gone to kindergarten together, all that stuff. As it turned out, though, Myungsoo and Sungyeol had only met a few years before Sungjong.

"He was my first friend," Myungsoo announced proudly, like there was something to be proud of in the fact that he hadn't had a single friend before Sungyeol came along.

"He was always sitting in a corner of the classroom all alone, like an idiot," Sungyeol recalled. "I couldn't leave him there like that. I just had to talk to him, you know."

But Sungjong thought back to how Sungyeol had approached him that day in the library, how he had gone out of his way to drag Sungjong out of his self-imposed solitude, and he thought that Sungyeol was a lot nicer than he pretended to be.

 

 

 

 

Sungjong thought his presence was good for those two. He balanced their friendship, acted as a sort of buffer; he wasn't as sharp and jarring as Sungyeol, but he was nowhere near as soft as Myungsoo, either. He fit in so well between them that it was like he had always been there, in a way.

Not that Sungjong didn't sometimes feel left out. It was inevitable: Myungsoo and Sungyeol had been friends long before they'd even met him, and it showed. There was a chemistry between them, borne of their years together, one that Sungjong could only look at from the outside. He envied it, he couldn't deny that, but he didn't let it bother him too much. He was grateful for what he had with them, already.

And Sungyeol and Myungsoo's friendship wasn't exactly perfect, either. Like they say there's always someone who loves more in every couple, so it was pretty clear that in Myungsoo and Sungyeol's friendship, Myungsoo was the one who liked the other the most. It was easy to tell—from the way he looked at Sungyeol with adoring eyes, how he laughed at even his lamest jokes like it was the funniest thing int the world, or how he clung to Sungyeol and hugged and touched him every chance he got, looking like he would like nothing more than to spend the rest of his life permanently attached to Sungyeol's back. Or maybe he just showed it more. Myungsoo was the type to have his emotions written on his face—be it hurt, happiness, or fondness; Sungyeol, for all of his outgoing and friendly attitude, was more secretive. Sungjong never really knew what was going on in that weird head of his, yet he was sure Sungyeol did care for Myungsoo, in his own way.

Whether it was as much as Myungsoo did for him, well, that was another question.

"Myungsoo really likes me, doesn't he," Sungyeol said once.

Sungjong rolled on his side to look at him. They were lying among the grass of the school yard, gazing lazily up at the clouds and not doing much of anything, really. Sungjong can't remember why Myungsoo wasn't there, but it was probably something temporary—a toilet break, or maybe he had been called by one of the teachers or something. He'd come back soon, anyway. It was hardly ever just two of them.

"Well, yeah." _Duh,_ Sungjong had to stop himself from adding. Myungsoo liking Sungyeol—a lot—was a well-known fact, one of those things that just were: the sky is blue, water is wet, Myungsoo likes Sungyeol. Not something you'd need to say out loud.

"I'm really grateful for that, you know," Sungyeol continued. He was looking up at the sky instead of at him. "For him. He's a great friend."

"Yeah." Sungjong thought about that one time he'd had to have his appendix taken out and Myungsoo had cried even more than him, holding his hand the whole time they were waiting at the hospital, before Sungjong had his surgery. How Sungjong woke out, later, to find Myungsoo curled up on the bed next to him, like a cat. Or how his face lit up every time he saw Sungjong, how he immediately ran up to him and hugged him, bending his body so that he was the same height as him. "He is. He's really nice."

"Uh-huh. But you know, sometimes… I don't know how to say this, but—sometimes, his feelings feel kind of… like a burden? Or something. He… he's just so _pure,_ you know. He likes me, he cares about me. It's obvious. And I… I don't know, when I'm with him, I feel kind of bad, sometimes. Dirty. I don't know if I can ever feel something like that, so pure, so disinterested. I'm not that good. Not even close."

Sungjong was still trying to process what Sungyeol had said when Sungyeol turned around just a bit, to glance at him. "Actually… Don't tell Myungsoo this, OK? But if I have to be honest… I feel more comfortable when I'm hanging out with you."

"… Are you saying I'm _dirty,_ or something?"

 _"No,_ you idiot! It's just that, I don't know… I think we're more similar." Sungyeol smiled at him. "We understand each other, you and I."

 

 

 

❄ ❄ ❄

 

 

 

Puberty came, as was inevitable, and changed everything. It was kind on Sungyeol and Myungsoo, especially Myungsoo. The awkward child Sungjong used to know—a squid, as Sungyeol would have described him—suddenly blossomed into a handsome young man. Maybe it was the fact that he had discovered the wonders of Magic Perm and that his face was no longer hidden behind a mass of hair, but Myungsoo was suddenly quite the teenage heartthrob. Sungjong would sometimes look at him, and have to do a double take. He almost couldn't believe that the unearthly handsome young man in front of him was really his long-time best friend.

That change in looks didn't reflect on Myungsoo's personality, though. Instead of feeding off it, Myungsoo's confidence crumbled under all the sudden, unwanted attention—girls and guys fawning over him at school, people stopping him in the street, secret admirers—and he curled upon himself, further back into his shell.

While Sungyeol's transformation wasn't as drastic, it was still obvious for everyone to see. He grew even taller, amazingly, his longs limbs filling out, so that while they were still slim they were now also toned and strong, not the delicate twigs they used to be. His face, by contrast, thinned out into a more adult shape, no more baby fat and chubby cheeks. He started drawing his eyebrows; dyed his hair and grew it long, got piercings.

As for Sungjong, he couldn't quite say he had changed for the worse. He was still good-looking. But now, it was in a decidedly handsome way. His voice dropped, of course; his jaw squared, and he had his own growth spurt, even surpassing Myungsoo, who had always been taller than him, so that he was now only a bit shorter than Sungyeol himself (he didn't have his proportions though, his long legs). Long gone were the days when he was mistaken for his family's non-existent eldest daughter, when his classmates forced him to dress up as a girl for school plays because he was "prettier than girls" (like girls had the prerogative over being pretty, or something). He was, no doubt about that, a man.

Sungjong hadn't expected to miss it—his delicate looks were the reason why he had been teased so much in the first place—yet looking back now, it had been fun to confuse people, to walk the thin line between genders, picking one or the other at will. No way he could do that now. And most of all, Sungjong didn't like the feeling of being a stranger in his own body, looking into the mirror and not recognising the person, the man that looked back at him.

Well, at least he wasn't _that_ hairy, not like Myungsoo or that human monkey that went by the name of Woohyun. Sungjong didn't think he would have been able to bear that.

And so he and Sungyeol and Myungsoo became popular as the hot trio of friends. Yet out of the three of them, Sungyeol was the only one who actually dated, picking up boyfriends and girlfriends here and there, like it was a game. Sungjong himself wasn't interested. As for Myungsoo, the reason why he never accepted any of the confessions he was always getting was clear enough, except perhaps to Myungsoo himself.

 

 

 

 ❄ ❄ ❄

 

 

 

The yearly school play was a tradition of sorts in their high school, something everyone looked forward to—mainly because being casted as one of the main characters inevitably brought along a spurt in popularity. That, however, also meant that while the main roles were highly sought after, no one wanted to do the others. The theatre club members had to constantly ran after students, trying to find someone who was willing to play them.

That year, though, the rules were tweaked a little bit, perhaps in the hopes of getting more people to join. Whomever was interested could apply at the drama club, then the names would be drawn and the roles assigned randomly. Which meant that anyone could potentially be chosen for the main roles, regardless of popularity or actual acting talent.

Suddenly, everyone and their mothers wanted to try. Sungyeol, who'd always been into acting and was a long-time member of the club, applied right away and went to the shrine near school everyday to pray he'd get Romeo—the play was, predictably enough, _Romeo and Juliet._ Myungsoo applied, too, and even Sungjong did, despite never having had much interest in (or talent for) acting. After all, what was the worst that could happen to him? Ending up as a tree, or perhaps a human bench, like Sunggyu had been forced to last year. He still complained about how that had given him permanent back pains, sometimes.

Yet no one could have predicted the actual results.

_"Juliet?!"_

Sungyeol's screech caught the attention of the people around them, although most were already looking at him, giggling and whispering among each other, some even laughing openly.

"I… i-it must be a mistake!" Sungyeol pointed at the result board, accusatively. "How can I play Juliet? I'm a _man!"_

"People have been playing characters of the opposite gender for centuries," Sungjong added in what he hoped was a comforting tone. "That's never stopped anyone."

"Easy for you to say, _Romeo,"_ Sungyeol spat, glaring at him.

Sungjong shrugged. He had gotten lucky for once. So what.

Myungsoo himself didn't have any comforting words to offer. He was too busy laughing his ass off with Woohyun, the two of them falling all over each other as they howled, like idiots. They could afford to laugh: after all, Myungsoo was apparently going to be a very handsome bush, and Woohyun—well, Sungjong wasn't very sure what Woohyun was going to be. He'd probably told them, but Sungjong had a habit of stopping listening the moment Woohyun opened his mouth.

"Uh, do you want to play Romeo instead of me?" Sungjong offered, later, after Sungyeol had yelled all his anger out and was now slumped over a school desk, head hidden dejectedly between his arms. "I can tell Miss Jung I changed my mind." Sungjong was sure there would be no shortage of girls eager to play Juliet in Sungyeol's place if he gave the role up.

"Nah," Sungyeol said, almost moaned. While adolescence had enhanced his looks, it had also robbed him of the natural brightness that had characterised him as a child. There was something sullen about him these days, and he didn't laugh or even smile half as much as he used to. "I always told you, didn't I? You'd make a good prince." Even though Sungjong thought Sungyeol was the one who looked like a prince, these days. "Romeo suits you. I don't want to be Juliet though. I mean, there's now way in hell I can, right? I'm a man. I'll just tell Miss Jung I'm dropping out of the play."

 

 

 

 

"Nope," was Miss Jung's curt response. "I'm sorry, but I can't let you drop Juliet. The rules were clear: the role you get, you have to stick with it."

"But _why?"_ Sungyeol wailed in despair. All of the teachers were looking at them; Sungjong wished he wouldn't be quite so loud. He kind of regretted coming along now—for moral support, as Sungyeol had put it. "I'm a guy! A _manly_ man! One of the manliest you'll ever know! Right, Sungjong?"

"Uhm," Sungjong said. He was thinking of Sungyeol's obsession with pink, of how he knew most SNSD choreographies by heart like he was a 10th member, even better than Sungjong, who usually excelled in that field. But then again, none of those things were necessarily unmanly, either.

"Don't you realise how absurd your request is, Sungyeol?" Even laid-back Miss Jung, who was very much used to Sungyeol's obnoxious ways, was starting to lose her patience. "We can't change the results now. Even if we give your role to someone else, people will still complain it was unfair—"

"No need for that," Sungyeol said quickly. "Sungjong and I can just switch roles. He can play Juliet."

Sungjong's jaw dropped open. _What?_

"He said so himself—"

"No I didn't," Sungjong snapped.

"You _did!_ You said you didn't mind giving up Romeo for me—"

"Yeah, but I never said I'm OK with playing Juliet—"

"Well, isn't it the same thing?"

"Like hell it is—"

Miss Jung was nodding along as they argued. "Good, good. You guys already sound like an old married couple, you'll make a great Romeo and Juliet." Sungjong blinked. _Married?_ "You can save your breath, though—I'm not going to change my mind. Even if Sungjong says he's OK with it, I won't let you switch roles."

"But _why?_ Just let Sungjong do it! He's the girly one!"

_"Hey!"_

"Nah, I like it better this way. Everyone would expect Sungjongie to play Juliet, but if it's you… " Miss Jung looked at Sungyeol, smiled. "Well, it's going to be interesting. By the way, did you know that the original cast at the time was all-male? Women weren't allowed to act back then. In a way, it will be more realistic this way."

But Sungyeol didn't look in the least comforted, or even resigned. "So what, do I have to suffer because of some old-ass sexist rule made at the dawn of time? Huh?"

Sungjong rolled his eyes. _Now_ he's a feminist.

_"… Juliet?"_

The words came out all in a rush, almost resembling a strangled sound. Sungjong turned around, towards where they had come from. Sunggyu was standing next to a teacher's desk, looking at them with a flabbergasted expression on his face.

Sunggyu was going through his rocker phase at the time, which meant he now dyed his hair and wore fake-used leather jackets over his uniform, but at heart he was still the same old Sunggyu. The teacher's pet who spent most of his time in the teachers' room. His relationship with Sungyeol hadn't improved much, either.

 _"He_ is going to play Juliet?" he said, pointing. "Sungyeol?"

"Yeah?" Sungyeol said defiantly, quite perversely so. "Why not?"

Sunggyu burst out laughing at that, clapping his hands and slapping his thigh and looking perhaps the most amused Sungjong had ever seen him. And they'd known each other for years.

 _"Why not?"_ he sputtered. "Sungyeol, look at you! You are three meters tall, and you have not an ounce of elegance or delicacy in you! How could anyone think you're a _woman?"_

Sunggyu kept laughing, the sound filling the silence that had fallen over the room. Sungjong stole a glance at Sungyeol. He was staring at Sunggyu, face expressionless, almost a mask.

His face was still blank when he finally turned around to face Miss Jung again.

"You know what? Nevermind what I said. I'm going to play Juliet, alright."

 

 

 

 

It was just like Sungyeol to do something just because someone said he couldn't. From that moment on, he poured his everything into the challenge, practicing the script like crazy. Sungjong had always thought that Sungyeol was a lot smarter than he let on, it's just that he never bothered to try; once he actually put in the effort, he was unstoppable. Sungjong was still trying to memorise his own lines by the time Sungyeol had already learnt both of theirs by heart.

"I'm going to play the best Juliet in the history of Juliets," he told Sungjong, dead serious, "And _you_ are going to help me."

Sungjong thought it would be nice if Sungyeol asked him for his opinion, sometimes.

"Sungyeollie is going all out, uh?" Myungsoo observed one time he had come to see them during rehearsals.

"Yeah… " Sungjong glanced towards where Sungyeol was sitting in a corner of the room, in front of a mirror, repeating his part over and over again as he gazed intently at his own reflection. Too busy to chat with them, apparently, and looking like an absolute idiot. "Guess we should thank Sunggyu hyung for that. Although I can't quite say he's any less annoying that when he _didn't_ want to play Juliet."

Myungsoo laughed. Yet there was something wistful in the way he looked at Sungyeol, too, gaze lingering longer than it should have.

"You're really lucky, Sungjongie… "

"Mh?"

"… You know, I… sometimes I kind of wish I'd gotten Romeo, as well…"

He met Sungjong's gaze, and blushed. "I mean—w-who wouldn't want to be Romeo—right?"

 

 

 

 

"There's something else we need to practice, you know," Sungyeol said one time.

"What?" Sungjong asked warily. Determined Sungyeol had turned to be quite a pain in the ass: he could make Sungjong repeat the stupidest, most irrelevant scene in the world a thousand times until he thought he'd gotten it right. "What is it now?"

"Kissing. There's a kiss scene in the middle, right?"

"I don't think they expect us to kiss for real, though." And how hard could kissing be? You just had to press your lips to someone else's for a few seconds. Big deal. "There's no need to practice that—"

 _"No need?"_ Sungyeol was suddenly wearing his take-no-shit face, which always looked out of place on him, since he was the one giving other people shit most of the time. "Sungjong, I think I told you already—I want this to be perfect. 100% perfect. I don't want any mistakes—and _that_ includes kissing. If you're not willing to put in as much effort—"

In the end, Sungjong caved in under Sungyeol's whining (as usual) and agreed that yeah, OK, they could practice kissing, if he wanted to. They sat facing each other, Sungyeol's eyes fluttering close. "OK. You may go ahead and kiss me."

Sungjong glared at him as he leaned in. "… You could at least _not_ make it sound like you're doing me a favor."

"I am. Not everyone can taste these sweet cherry lips, you know. It's an honour."

"There's a thousand things I'd rather do than kiss you."

"Oh really? Like what?"

Instead of replying, Sungjong just covered the distance that still separated them and pressed his lips against Sungyeol's. The sooner they got this over with, the better. Sungjong was counting the seconds in his mind until he could pull away, when Sungyeol opened his mouth.

It must have been minutes later when they finally broke apart. Sungyeol's lips were red and swollen, kind of shiny; from the tingling all over his, Sungjong could tell they probably looked about the same.

"Not bad," Sungyeol said, swiping a thumb over his bottom lip. Sungjong himself couldn't speak. "We still need to practice more, though."

 

 

 

 

Sungjong replayed the scene over and over again in his mind as he lay in bed back in his room, later. He was staring at the ceiling, unseeing, tongue poking out and tracing his bottom lip, the same way Sungyeol's had.

Sungjong wanted to do it again.

 

 

 

 

They developed a pattern. They would be practicing as usual, rehearsing this scene and that and checking the script from time to time, when Sungyeol would suddenly close the book with a snap and sit down. "Alright, let's practice kissing." Then he would close his eyes and part is lips and let Sungjong kiss him, sucking and nibbling—that was a new one for Sungjong, one that he enjoyed very much—for as long as he liked.

Sungjong started looking forward to those moments, those words. It was all he seemed to be able to think about. Sometimes they would be practicing, or doing something else altogether, and Sungjong would look at Sungyeol's lips, plump and inviting, and have to stop himself from leaning in.

 

 

 

 

In the meantime, something else was going on.

"There's something… I need to tell you, Jongie."

Sungjong looked at Myungsoo, eyebrows raised. "Sure, go ahead."

"Uh… I—" Myungsoo swallowed, visibly nervous. "You can't tell anyone. Especially _not_ Sungyeol."

"Don't worry, I won't. That guy has a big mouth, doesn't he? So what is it?"

"… Y-you can't laugh at me, either!"

"Hyung—"

"You really can't!"

"OK, OK, I get it! Seriously, just spit it out!"

"I… I—I like Sungyeol," Myungsoo blurted out, so quickly that it took Sungjong a moment to make out what he had actually said. "Uh, I think… _H-hey,_ you said you wouldn't laugh!"

"I'm not," Sungjong said, grinning. "Hyung, what was all that confession for?"

"W-what do you mean? I… I wanted you to know—"

"Hyung, but I already _knew._ Everybody does."

Myungsoo looked down at his lap, flustered. "What… about Sungyeol?"

"That I don't know. Who knows what goes on in that weirdo's head?"

"… Well, I… " Myungsoo rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly. "I just wanted to let you know, that's all… "

 

 

 

❄ ❄ ❄

 

 

 

The day of the performance arrived.

Sungyeol wore his Juliet outfit—long wig and old-fashioned, long-skirted dress—for the first time. Sungjong thought he looked unexpectedly, almost unfairly good like that—a lot better than Sungjong himself had back in his glory days—but he decided to keep that to himself lest he wounded Sungyeol's… manly pride. He definitely wasn't the only one thinking so though, judging from the way people were staring at Sungyeol in awe, girls and boys alike. Even Sunggyu seemed to like it, if the dumbstruck (lovestruck?) expression on his face every time he looked at Sungyeol was any indication.

"Let's not do it," Sungyeol whispered to him suddenly, literally minutes before they were set to perform. "Let's not kiss for real."

Sungjong is pretty sure he must have been gaping. "What?"

"Let's just not. You can kiss me the normal way—just, press your lips against mine—"

 _"What?_ Then what did we practice so much for—"

"Just do as I say, Sungjong."

"But… you're the one who—"

"Well, I changed my mind," Sungyeol snapped, already turning away. "Gonna go take a leak—we don't want to have to sneak backstage while we're on, do we—"

Sungjong glared at his retreating back. He was tired of this way Sungyeol always acted, like Sungjong—and everybody else—was going to do whatever he said without even questioning it. It was time somebody taught him a lesson.

 

 

 

 

Sungyeol closed his eyes when the scene came up, lips pursed ever so slightly, expectantly. Sungjong took a deep breath and leaned in.

He felt Sungyeol gasp as he slipped his tongue out and deepened the kiss, showing him everything that Sungyeol himself had taught him.

Sungjong was slightly breathless as he pulled away. He looked at Sungyeol. He was looking, staring back at him, lips parted and eyes wide and bright with anger, or maybe something else.

Sungjong smirked.

 

 

 

 

Everyone was in an uproar about it, later.

"You… you did it… " Myungsoo was staring at them, holding his flushed cheeks between his hands. He looked quite comical in his all-green onesie and the leaves stuck around his head to simulate a bush. "You kissed… for real… "

"I think the girls enjoyed it a bit too much," Woohyun said, wiggling his eyebrows. Most girls from the drama club were huddled in a corner of the backstage room, murmuring excitedly among themselves and letting out shrieks of delight whenever they turned around to steal a glance at Sungjong or Sungyeol. Sungjong didn't know what their deal was. "Wouldn't be surprised if videos or pictures of it started being circulated online."

Sungjong didn't understand why everyone was so hung up on the kiss. What about the rest of the play they'd put so much effort into?

As for Sungyeol, Sungjong had thought he was going to be furious with him for disregarding his orders, but he didn't even mention it. Instead, he kept complaining. "That was so fucking embarrassing. I can't believe my family saw it. Even my grandmother was there! I don't know why I thought it was a good idea to dress up as a girl. Please hit me or something if I ever decide to do something like this again. I'm _never_ doing it again. Like, ever."

Sungjong looked at him as he rambled on to everybody who would listen. He really didn't understand Sungyeol sometimes. Most of the time.

 

 

 

 ❄ ❄ ❄

 

 

 

One night—Sungjong isn't sure how much time had passed since then, but it can't have been long—he was woken up by a strange, distant sound, like a tree branch rapping against his window, or something. Sungjong assumed it was just that, and tried to go back to sleep.

He couldn't, though. The sound was insistent, _tap tap tap,_ again and again, like it was calling out to Sungjong.

In the end, Sungjong pulled himself up to his feet, groaning, and went to investigate.

As he neared the window after switching on the light he saw something small hit the glass, only to fall back down again. A small stone—a pebble.

What the fuck?

Sungjong looked down into the yard, gingerly, and almost had a heart attack when he saw a dark, tall figure standing just under his window, hand posed to throw yet another pebble, most likely. Then the figure shifted and the light from the outside lamp revealed Sungyeol's face.

 _"What the fuck are you doing?"_ Sungjong shout-whispered, head hanging out of the window.

 _"I can't sleep!"_ Sungyeol hissed back.

_"What?"_

_"I can't! Please let me in, Jongie!"_

Sungjong couldn't believe it. "What the fuck are you doing here?" he asked Sungyeol after he had, eventually, let him in and ushered him to his room, reminding him to be quiet every two seconds because Sungyeol just couldn't be bothered. "It's the middle of the night."

"Couldn't sleep," Sungyeol said again, as if that was explanation enough.

"So you thought it was a good idea to come here and drag me out of bed, too?" Sungyeol lived on the other side of town, and even in such a small town as theirs, that meant he had to cycle a good half an hour to get to Sungjong's place. That was, if he cycled _fast_. Not exactly a good remedy for insomnia.

As he always did when he didn't know what to say or found himself in an awkward spot, Sungyeol ignored him. "Let's watch a movie," he announced, making no attempt to be quiet.

 _"Sungyeol!_ My family are sleeping—"

"Yeah, OK, I get it. So d'you have anything interesting?"

But to Sungjong's surprise, Sungyeol started nodding off as soon as the movie started, the one earbud Sungjong had slipped into his ear slipping right out.

"I thought you said you couldn't sleep?"

"I can't."

When Sungyeol dozed off for the fourth time, Sungjong closed his laptop with a snap.

"Seriously, just go home and sleep!"

"You want me to go home _now?_ It's like, 2 am. It's freezing cold—"

"Just go back the way you came!"

In the end, Sungjong got Sungyeol another pillow and begrudgingly let him share his bed. Sungyeol started snoring the moment his head hit the pillow; it took Sungjong forever to fall asleep with all the ruckus he was making. Damn him.

All of Sungjong's annoyance was gone by morning, though, when he woke up with his legs and arms tangled with Sungyeol's, his body so close that Sungjong had his face buried in his hair, breathing him in.

 

 

 

 

It became an habit, sort of. It wasn't every night, but looking back now, they were definitely more the nights Sungyeol slept over at Sungjong's place than those he didn't. Sungyeol would show up some time between late afternoon and dinner time. He and Sungjong would hang out like they always did, chatting or watching a movie or whatever, and then they would go to bed.

Sungjong started feeling like he was living a double life. "Sungyeol really doesn't like skinship, does he," Myungsoo would say, resignedly, after he had tried to climb over Sungyeol's back for the hundredth time and Sungyeol had simply shrugged him off without blinking an eye, as usual.

"No," Sungjong said, and he would think of how Sungyeol scooted close to him, at night; how he took Sungjong's hands and intertwined their fingers, pressing them against his chest, clasped. How he would instantly wake up every time Sungjong got out of bed to go to the toilet or something, no matter how quiet Sungjong tried to be. He'd grab Sungjong's arm, almost frantic. "Where are you going?"

"Toilet," Sungjong croaked, mouth pasty with sleep. "Gotta pee."

Sungyeol didn't say anything, but Sungjong could still feel his reproaching look, even in the pitch dark. "What, d'you want me to pee on the bed or something?"

"Just be quick," Sungyeol mumbled.

He was always waiting when Sungjong climbed back into bed, shortly after (as embarrassing as it sounds, he always did try to be as quick as possible), hands grabbing at Sungjong and pulling him closer, until Sungjong's body was pressed, wrapped around his again. Only then did he sigh and fall back to sleep.

"Can't. I already have something to do tonight," Sungyeol would say sometimes when Myungsoo asked him to hang out. And then he would look at Sungjong—not a meaningful, or even a long look, just a glance, but it was enough to let Sungjong know that he should say he was busy if Myungsoo or anybody else asked him to hang out, too, because Sungyeol was coming around tonight.

Sometimes Sungjong found himself wondering if those nights weren't but a figment of his imagination. That's what they felt like—a dream. Maybe because they never talked about it. There wasn't much to talk about, really. All they did was lie there, side by side, Sungyeol's back pressed against Sungjong's chest. Sungjong's hands would wander, sometimes, slipping under clothes and tracing the lines of Sungyeol's body, and Sungyeol let him.

It was like getting to know Sungyeol all over again. Sungjong had seen Sungyeol naked, of course, thought he was familiar enough with his body, but—never like this. He hadn't known, before, how soft some parts of Sungyeol were, how sensitive. Like the flesh of his belly, still slightly pudgy, like when they were kids. Or how ticklish the patch of skin behind Sungyeol's knee was, always making Sungyeol break out into giggles whenever Sungjong touched it—or how the giggles would invariably quiet down and turn breathy, low as Sungjong's fingers edged upwards, along the line of Sungyeol's thigh. And sometimes Sungyeol would turn around and hug Sungjong, burying his face into his chest, long limbs and all, and Sungjong would hug him back, pressing their bodies even closer together.

There was only one time–––Sungyeol took Sungjong's hand as it stroked his hipbone, slipped it between his legs. Even through the fabric of his pyjama bottoms, he was warm, hard.

"Please… "

And Sungjong did it, stroking Sungyeol with nervous, uncertain fingers, worried that he wouldn't know what to do, how to make it good for him. The sounds Sungyeol made, though—sounds that Sungjong has still etched in his memory, breathy whimpers and gasps that almost sounded like Sungyeol was crying, that would have made Sungjong worry he was in pain or something, if he hadn't been holding him in his hand, burning hot and sticky. They had a strange effect on Sungjong, made him feel hot, feverish too, made him press against Sungyeol as he touched him, until their warmth mixed, and it's like they were one, whole.

 

 

 

❄ ❄ ❄ 

 

 

 

"… Do you think I should ask Sungyeol out?"

Sungjong was taken aback by Myungsoo's question. He doesn't know why, really. "What?"

Myungsoo shifted on his feet. "I mean… he isn't dating anyone right now, is he?"

"… No," Sungjong said, and the words were like sandpaper in his mouth. "No, I don't think he is."

"Right? And, well, it's the first time in ages that he isn't seeing anyone, so I thought—"

Sungjong's mind slipped away as Myungsoo kept talking. There was strange, sinking feeling in his stomach. Like a rock.

 

 

 

 

"This is a shit idea if there ever was one. I mean sure, you were never the sharpest tool in the box, but this is falling low even for you."

"Jiae, please—"

"No, listen to me, Sungjong. I don't know why you suddenly want people to believe I'm your girlfriend or something, but trust me, it's not going to work. Even if I were OK with it—which, mind you, I'm not saying I am—no one is going to buy it."

"Why not… ?"

Jiae threw her hands up in frustration. _"Why not?_ Sungjong, I'm a _lesbian!_ I'm gay as fuck! As… as gay as a gay woman could possibly be! Everybody knows that."

"… Preferences can change, though."

"Well, not mine, thank you very much." Jiae sighed, gave him a sideways, narrow look. "Don't you have someone else you can ask? Like the hoards of adoring girls and boys following you everywhere. Why me?"

But that was just the thing. There were tons of people that Sungjong could have asked to be in a pretend relationship with him, sure—his admirers, as Jiae had said, would be more than eager—but would they get the _pretend_ part clearly enough? Sungjong couldn't be sure. Jiae, someone who would never, ever be interested in him that way, was his safest bet.

"You know what you're asking of me?" Jiae was saying. "I can't date, I can't even sleep with anyone until this thing goes on."

"You can," Sungjong said. "Just… uhm, don't let other people know about it, I guess."

The look Jiae was giving him was eloquent enough.

"I know," Sungjong said. "I know I'm asking for a lot—I wouldn't if I had any other choice—but.. you're the only one I can ask. If you do this for me, I… I will do whatever you want. I promise."

Jiae looked at him. Out of all the people he had met through Myungsoo and Sungyeol, Jiae was the one Sungjong had actually gotten close to, to a deeper level than most other acquaintances. There was something about Jiae that just clicked with him. She had a lot more sharp edges and was blunter than him, but essentially, their outlook on life was the same. They shared the same mistrust of most people, the same sense that they were, in some ways, better than them. To the point that sometimes Sungjong felt like Jiae was a female version of him, or that he was a male version or Jiae. Either way, they were on the same page.

At length, Jiae looked away, and sighed.

 

 

 

 

 _"Jiae?"_ Myungsoo said, eyebrows raised, when Sungjong told them he had gotten himself a girlfriend.

"Yeah." Sungjong tried to sound casual, if not cheerful.

"But… I thought she was—you know—"

"Well, I guess she isn't. Since she's dating me."

Myungsoo still looked at him weirdly.

Sungyeol was surprisingly unfazed by it. "Good for you, man," he said, slapping Sungjong on the back. "You're finally going to get some too, uh? Ah, even our Sungjongie has grown up~"

 

 

 

 

Sungjong wasn't even surprised when Sungyeol came by at his place, later that night. He let him in as usual, handed him a pair of slippers.

"You can't sleep over tonight though," he said, casually, as they climbed up the stairs to his room. "Unless you want to take the guest room."

"… What? Why?"

"Well, because—"

Jiae chose that very moment to open the door and peer at them from inside Sungjong's bedroom—opening it just enough to show she was wearing her pyjamas. Perfect timing. "Jongie—" Her eyes widened when she saw Sungyeol. "Sungyeol? What are you doing here?"

Sungyeol didn't answer. Sungjong didn't look at him, but he could feel him go still, stiff behind him.

"He just stopped by," he told Jiae. "I was thinking we could watch a movie together or som—"

"No," Sungyeol said. "No, I'll just—"

He turned around and climbed down the stairs and out of the house without another word, without even finishing that sentence.

 

 

 

 

"Yeollie… can I talk to you for a second?"

Myungsoo looked calm enough, yet Sungjong knew very well how nervous he really was. They'd had to practice asking Sungyeol that question, and the rest of his confession, a hundred times before he felt confident enough to actually do it in front of him.

Sungyeol hardly looked up from his phone. "Yeah, sure. What is it?"

"Uh… Can we talk alone?"

Sungyeol looked up at him now, an eyebrow raised. "We _are_ alone."

"Uhm… " Myungsoo glanced at Sungjong, quite unsubtly. "Well—"

"Ah," Sungyeol scoffed, "It's just _Sungjong."_ Like his name was some sort of particularly gross insect. His and Sungyeol's relationship wasn't the best, lately. "What could you possibly have to say that he can't hear, too?"

Myungsoo just stood there, squirming, and so Sungjong decided to take matters into his own hands.

"Nevermind," he said as he got to his feet, "I'll go." His shoulder brushed against Myungsoo's, gently, as he walked away.

 

 

 

 

When he saw Sungyeol again, later that day, he was alone. He looked dumbfounded, like someone had struck him, hard, and he hadn't quite recovered yet. Typical. Only Sungyeol could have been surprised by Myungsoo's confession.

Sungyeol's eyes met his just at that moment, as if he'd heard his thoughts. Sungjong looked away.

 

 

 

 

"… Myungsoo confessed to me."

"Yeah, I know."

"You knew about this?"

"You're the only one who didn't, hyung."

"…Well… What do you think I should do?"

"I don't know. It's up to you, isn't it?"

"… I… I don't know, I—I like Myungsoo, of course I do… but—"

"Well, doesn't that answer your question then?"

 

 

 

 

They actually went on double dates a couple of times. They were hell of everyone involved, Sungjong suspected, except Myungsoo, perhaps. He was the one who had suggested it in the first place, after all. "Wouldn't it be cool if we all went out together sometimes? I mean, now that Yeollie and I are dating, and you have Jiae—"

He seemed so excited about the idea that Sungjong couldn't find it in himself to say no.

Sungyeol looked at Jiae the first time, a perfunctory, ice-cold glance like only Sungyeol could manage. "Thought you liked girls?"

"Though my sexuality was none of your business?"

That was the extent of their interactions.

To say that Sungjong didn't enjoy those dates was an understatement. Yet there were also enjoyable things. First and foremost, the fact that Jiae hated it all so much.

 _"I want to die,"_ she cringed whenever someone—usually some well-meaning, too-friendly ajhumma—complimented them on how good they looked together, and wouldn't Jiae make a lovely bride. Sungjong was almost expecting them to ask if they'd chosen the name for the baby yet. "I can feel the weight of heteronormativity on my shoulders—it's _choking_ me! Seriously, do straights have to put up with this all the time? How do they deal?"

"Well, I guess it's not too bad if you're actually straight?"

Jiae shuddered. "Good thing I'll never find out."

It was even funnier when a cute girl came around, and Jiae had to visibly, physically restrain herself from hitting on her. "I should kill you, you know," she whispered to Sungjong through gritted teeth. "For all the pussy I'm not getting."

Sungjong just laughed.

As for Myungsoo and Sungyeol, not much had changed in their relationship, as far as Sungjong could see. Myungsoo clung to Sungyeol and gave him heart eyes, Sungyeol tolerated it.

"Those two are getting as much action as us," Jiae declared after their first double date. But Sungjong knew for a fact that Sungyeol and Myungsoo were actually doing it. Although—

"I don't think Sungyeol likes it," Myungsoo had confessed to him once.

"Well… " Sungjong really wished he didn't have to act as Myungsoo's confidante for his and Sungyeol's relationship, but he knew Myungsoo had no one else to talk about that kind of stuff with, and so he put up with it. "What makes you say that?"

"I… I don't know, I just—I don't think he does. And also… " Myugsoo trailed off, his voice turning so small Sungjong wasn't sure he heard him well. "Sometimes…

 

… Sometime I'm not sure Sungyeol likes _me,_ either."

 

 

 

 

Sungjong was reminded of another time, a snippet of conversation he shouldn't have heard. It was after a party at someone's place; people were leaving, and Sungjong was helping the host tidy the mess up, carrying a pile of dirty dishes into the kitchen, when he heard a familiar voice.

"Hyung."

It was Sungyeol, sitting on the kitchen table, long legs dangling in front of him as Sunggyu washed the dishes, soaping them up and then rinsing them methodically.

"Hyung… how do you know you like someone?"

"What?" Sunggyu grumbled.

"I mean… how do you know if you _really_ like someone? Like, if you are in love with them, or something. How do you know for sure?"

"Yah, why are you asking me? I'm not your father. Go ask your parents, or something."

Sungjong was expecting Sungyeol to reiterate, to push and pester Sunggyu until he finally gave him his answer, whatever that would be. But he didn't. He was uncharacteristically quiet, like he had accepted Sunggyu's refusal (which Sungyeol never, ever did), like he couldn't even be bothered to insist.

Maybe that was why Sunggyu took pity on him (quite unlike himself, too) and eventually gave him an answer of sorts.

"Well… it's not like there's a definite answer, or a way to know for sure. Uhm… you just… you just kind of know. You just _feel_ it, you know?"

"Feel it… ?" Sungjong could just about see Sungyeol's profile from where he was standing behind the threshold, hidden from view. He was frowning. "I don't get it… what am I supposed to _feel,_ exactly?

 

 

 

 

Sungjong was walking to the men's toilet, his mind in a haze like it always was lately, especially when they were on these surreal double dates, unable to focus on anything but keeping himself together, somehow. He was just about to step past the threshold when he walked right into something—

Someone, their hands slipping around Sungjong's waist, steadying him.

"Hey."

Sungjong looked up. It was Sungyeol, his face so close Sungjong could see the ripples his eyelashes made on his skin when he blinked, could feel the gentle tickling of his breath.

"Sorry," Sungjong said.

"No problem." Sungjong thought he had never noticed the way Sungyeol's eyes crinkled up when he smiled, how endearing it was. Or maybe he had just never seen it this up close. "Just watch where you're going next time."

Sungjong kept looking at him. It wasn't a very good idea, because Sungyeol's lips were right there, in front of him, drawing Sungjong's attention to them, making him unable to think about anything else. He saw Sungyeol's own eyes flit down for a moment, and he knew that Sungyeol was looking at his lips, too.

Sungjong swallowed.

"… I… need to go. Uhm. To the toilet—"

"Go, then," Sungyeol said, lips moving like they were beckoning him closer. His hands were still on Sungjong's hips, warm. "I'm not stopping you."

Sungjong had to literally jerk himself away from him, even though Sungyeol really wasn't doing anything to hold him back. He was stumbling as he walked into the bathroom, heart hammering in his chest.

 

 

 

Jiae was giving him a knowing look when Sungjong came back to their table, later.

"I saw that, you know," she murmured as he slipped in next to her.

"Saw what?"

"… You're a self-sacrificing idiot Sungjong, you know that?"

 

 

 

 ❄ ❄ ❄

 

 

 

Sungyeol and Myungsoo graduated at the end of that year. Myungsoo didn't get into his first-choice university, and so he decided to take a year off, to clear his mind, try the entrance exam again next year. Sungyeol enrolled at the local university—took up Korean literature, at least in theory. From what Sungjong heard around, Sungyeol hardly ever did any studying.

His choice had surprised Sungjong. Sungyeol could have gotten into the best universities in Seoul, if he'd tried. It was clear that he hadn't. It's like he didn't even care anymore.

Sungjong's own last year of high school was quite uneventful, until the graduation dinner. He walked to his assigned place, wondering who he'd ended up next to. And looked right into Sungyeol's staring face.

Sungyeol looked away quickly. It felt like a long time since Sungjong had been this close to him. After his and Myungsoo's graduation they hadn't really seen much of each other, and whenever they did happen to be in the same room Sungyeol looked like he'd just swallowed something sour. Sungjong felt the same way, although he couldn't quite say why.

The place was noisy enough for the two of them to ignore each other comfortably. Yet Sungjong couldn't fully relax, could never forget Sungyeol next to him.

"… So you're going to Seoul."

"… Uh."

"Guess that this hole of a town isn't enough for you, huh?"

"Seoul was my first choice. It's the best university for my major." And I need to get out of here, fast.

"Right. Spoken like a true prince. I always knew you had something of the royalty about you, prince Sungjong."

Sungjong decided not to answer that.

Some time later that night, some sort of fortune cookies started being handed out around the table.

"They're our special love cookies," the restaurant owner explained cheerfully as she went around the table, encouraging people to take one. "Most of them are plain, but one—only one—has a special lucky charm hidden inside. If you are lucky enough to get it, you should give it to the person you like, and your love will come true."

As expected, most people just laughed or cringed, rolled their eyes. "What bullshit," Sungyeol himself scoffed next to Sungjong, throwing the crushed remains of his empty cookie into his mouth. "Can't they just put money in it or something?"

Yet Sungjong didn't need to look for Myungsoo to know that his eyes would be sparkling with hope as he broke his cookie in two, eagerly. And that the sparkle would fade once he saw inside, be replaced by disappointment.

Because the lucky charm was inside Sungjong's.

 

 

 

 

… What a joke, Sungjong thought. Yet he didn't just leave the lucky charm there on the table, or toss it away. He slipped it inside his pocket and kept turning it between the fingers of one hand, round and round, the whole night.

 

 

 

 

Somehow the night blurred past and then drew to a close; people started to leave one by one. Sungjong himself was about to leave when he approached Sungyeol, outside the restaurant.

"Hyung."

Sungyeol turned around. "What—" He stared, almost seemed to do a double take when he saw Sungjong. "… Did you want something?"

Sungjong looked at him, handsome face just faintly lit by the street lights. _Give me your hand,_ he wanted to say. Or, _this is for you._ But he could hear Myungsoo's laughter, could see him a few feet away, talking with someone he didn't know. It was only a matter of seconds before he turned towards them. He couldn't risk it.

And so he simply reached out, hand slipping inside the pocket of Sungyeol's jacket and dropping something. "Here."

Sungyeol blinked, hand already reaching in after his. "What—"

But Sungjong turned around and walked away, quickly, before Sungyeol could see what it was.

 

 

 

 

Other than his family, Myungsoo was the only one who came to see him off at the bus station. Sungjong was relieved by Sungyeol's absence. He wouldn't have put it past him to show up.

"Take care, hyung," Sungjong said after he had hugged his family goodbye, a hand squeezing Myungsoo's shoulder. "See you soon, OK?"

"OK," Myungsoo said blankly. He hadn't cried at all so far, which had surprised Sungjong—usually with Myungsoo every chance was good to turn on the faucets—but he looked as if he were sunk in a sort of numb disbelief, like he had been informed they were going to cut his leg or arm off, and he hadn't managed to digest the news yet. He was clutching Sungjong's arm, so hard it was starting to hurt.

"You have to visit me in Seoul, uh?"

"Yeah. Yeah—I'll visit. Definitely."

"I'm counting on it, then—"

That was when Myungsoo lost his self-restraint and finally threw himself at Sungjong, enveloping him in a tight, bone-crushing hug.

"I'll miss you, Sungjongie… "

As the bus drove away and Sungjong glanced back, at his family and Myungsoo waving at him and getting smaller and smaller, he felt like a part of him was being a cut off, too.

 

 

 

❄ ❄ ❄

 

 

 

_what are you doing?_

 

Sungjong stared at the screen. The sender ID clearly said _Sungyeol,_ yet it had been so long since he had last heard from him—especially liked this, by kakao, the way they used to talk all the time, once—that he found it hard to believe it was really him.

 

_nothing much_

_you?_

_nothing_

_thinking about you_

 

Sungjong stared at the words, hard, until a new message popped up.

 

_sorry_

_i'm a bit drunk, actually_

 

Sungjong rolled his eyes. Go figure.

 

_just a bit?_

 

The phone startled him as it started vibrating in his hands.

"You found me out," Sungyeol's voice chuckled on the other side of the phone, making Sungjong's chest tighten. He hadn't realised how much he had missed it. "I'm kinda wasted."

Sungjong didn't think he sounded wasted, though. A bit tipsy, perhaps, but nothing more. "Are you drinking your worries away, or something?"

Sungyeol laughed, and Sungjong felt the butterflies again, swarming painfully in his belly. _"No—_ well, actually, yes… something like that, I guess. Uh… what about you?"

"Mh?"

"Why are you still up?"

"Just revising."

"At this time of the night? Wow. Universities in Seoul are really something else, uh?"

"It's OK. It's not too bad, really."

Small talk had never been their forte; they ran out of things to talk about rather quickly, and then they were both silent.

"So, uh… did you need anything, or… ?"

"Oh. No, I—not really. Sorry—"

"It's fine."

They were quiet again after that. Sungjong could clearly hear the sound of Sungyeol breathing on the other side of the phone. If he closed his eyes and pressed the phone even closer to his ear he could almost pretend Sungyeol was there, lying in bed next to him.

"… I guess we should hang up, uh? It's already late, and you probably have class tomorrow—"

"Mh."

"I'll… talk to you later then, I guess."

"Yeah, OK. Goodnight."

Sungyeol's voice was low and soothing, like a caress, warm fingers sending shivers all over Sungjong's skin.

"Goodnight, Sungjongie… "

 

 

 

 

_"Sungjongie~"_

The slurred, uneven quality to his voice confirmed Sungjong's suspicions. He had known it since his phone had started ringing, Sungyeol's name flashing on the screen. "What, are you drunk again?"

"What, do I have to be drunk to call you?" Sungyeol giggled, but there was a bitter undertone to his voice.

Well, that's the only times when you ever call me, Sungjong thought. "So do you actually have something to say this time?"

Sungyeol burst out laughing—suddenly, almost startling Sungjong. "Sungjong," he muttered in between huffs of laughter, "Sungjong Sungjong Sungjong Sungjong—"

Sungjong felt stiff as he held the phone to his ear. _What?_ he wanted to say, but there was something weird, almost desperate in the way Sungyeol kept repeating his name, over and over again, and he couldn't say anything.

Sungyeol kept saying his name until it had morphed into a mumbled, indistinct sound, until the laughter had subsided and all Sungjong could hear on the other side of the phone was heavy breathing, and Sungjong didn't think Sungyeol was laughing anymore.

"… Sungjong… Why did you have to go to Seoul… ? "

 

 

 

❄ ❄ ❄

 

 

 

Myungsoo never actually visited him in Seoul. Sungjong saw him whenever he went back home to visit, those few times a year. He never saw much of Sungyeol then: he was like a blur, gone before Sungjong had time to blink. Those few glimpses were unsettling enough that Sungjong knew he didn't want to see more of him.

Myungsoo was always the same, handsome and sweet and awkward. But around his fifth visit or so, Sungjong realised that there was something slightly… _different_ about him. It wasn't anything obvious; it was more in the way he held himself now, no longer hunching his shoulders and letting his fringe fall into his eyes as if to hide his face, himself from the world. A new, steady glint in his eyes.

 

 

 

 ❄ ❄ ❄

 

 

 

The news of Myungsoo and Sungyeol's break up was rather anticlimactic. Sungjong didn't even learn it from Myungsoo himself.

"—and Myungsoo actually broke up with him," Woohyun told him, breathless. He and Sungjong hadn't really talked since Sungjong had moved to Seoul, years ago; it was just like Woohyun to call him after all that time simply to impart a piece of gossip. "Can you believe it? Baby Myungsoo? And he was always so smitten—"

Sungjong later found out from other (more reliable) sources that the break up had been amicable enough; Myungsoo and Sungyeol were still good friends, they just weren't dating anymore.

"So what are you going do now?" Jiae asked him the next time they went out to eat together. She'd moved to Seoul around the same time Sungjong had; someone like her had never really belonged back in their hometown.

"What d'you mean?"

Jiae stopped cutting her omelet to give him a look. "Hello? Your man is free now, or so I hear. Are you finally going to stop being a self-sacrificing idiot and actually _do_ something?"

 _My man?_ Sungjong hadn't talked to Sungyeol, hadn't even seen him in years. "I'm not going to do anything. There's nothing to do." It's too late, anyway.

 

 

 

 

When Myungsoo finally moved to Seoul too, shortly after that, Sungjong went to pick him up at the bus station.

"I broke up with Sungyeol, you know," Myungsoo told him almost casually as Sungjong helped him carry his luggage to the taxi.

"Yeah, I heard."

Myungsoo looked at him. Sungjong saw his lips part, as if to say something. But then he seemed to think better of it and closed his mouth, looked away again.

 

 

 

❄ ❄ ❄

 

 

 

Sungjong never dated. Not back at university, nor later. He just wasn't interested. Sometimes, though, the longing got too much, and so he picked up boys. As cliché would have it, he would look for guys like Sungyeol—tall and slim, big eyes and bright, loud laughter—but Sungjong didn't. If anything, he avoided them. He didn't want to be reminded of him.

Those guys were nothing like Sungyeol, anyway: he would never be so compliant, would never spread his legs for Sungjong so easily. And still sometimes the past stole up on him, in the downward slope of an eye that Sungjong hadn't noticed when he had approached the guy, earlier; the timbre of his voice as he came, high-pitched and breathy like the one Sungjong had heard that time, so many years ago; a mole placed eerily just beside the ear. Those small details always caught Sungjong off guard, made him want to run away.

The sex itself was great. Easy, quick, satisfying. Those guys never wanted more from him, and those rare times they did, Sungjong made it very clear that he couldn't give it to them. Exactly what he needed. It was only sometimes, when whatever guy he had hooked up with this time would simply fall asleep next to him afterwards, without linking their hands together and pressing them against his chest; or when Sungjong had to get up to go to the toiler or something and the guy would just sleep on undisturbed, no reproaching eyes or hands trying to hold him back—that Sungjong felt sadness wash over him, a hollow, aching spot in his chest.

 

 

 

❄ ❄ ❄

 

 

 

Myungsoo's call the other day had taken him by surprise, his request even more so.

"Do you have something to do on the 24th?"

"No, not really… why?"

"Why don't we hang out together?"

Sungjong paused. "Shouldn't you be with Dongwoo?"

"Oh, that's OK—we already see each other everyday, anyway. I want to do something special with you."

Even now that they both live in Seoul, he and Myungsoo don't see each other all that often. A phone call every few weeks, a cup of coffee or a meal together even less frequently. Their lives are different now.

He'd seen Myungsoo fairly recently, though—a couple of weeks before, for a sort of Christmas-slash-reunion party that their friends from their hometown that had moved to Seoul had organised. Sungjong didn't think he would be going, but in the end, he had. He wasn't sure why.

He knew that Sungyeol would be there, too. He'd eventually moved to Seoul, like everybody else. As he had heard it from Sunggyu—he and Sungjong kept in touch surprisingly often; Sunggyu was one of the few school friends of his who had stayed back in their hometown, but he still kept track of everybody, like a mother hen of sorts—Sungyeol had tried his hand at acting, and when that hadn't quite worked out, he had switched to modelling, with more success. Sungjong had been surprised. He'd worked in the field briefly back when he was still a university student, and he knew all too well what a harsh, demanding world it could be. He couldn't imagine Sungyeol putting up with it, abiding to all those strict rules.

He got his answer as soon as he saw him at the party. Sungyeol looked different—so different that for a moment, Sungjong almost didn't recognise him, long hair dyed back to black and cut short (the standard bowl cut you can see on 90% of guys in South Korea, but Sungyeol made it look stylish), no sign of piercings left. His cheeks were the thinnest Sungjong had ever seen them—which Sungjong assumed came with the job, but he still felt a pang at the sight.

And as he looked at him, Sungjong had no doubt that fashion brands would be willing to bend the rules, to do away with them even if that meant they could have Lee Sungyeol working for them.

"… Hi."

"Hey."

"Uh… How have you been?"

"I'm good. You?"

"I'm fine—" A pause. "You look… good."

Eyes turning into crescents, a hint of gums, making Sungjong's brain and everything else, too, turn to mush. "You don't look too bad yourself, Sungjongie."

And, fuck. All those years, and nothing had changed.

 

 

 

 

Sungjong had already heard about Myungsoo's boyfriend, of course—the first person he'd ever dated since he and Sungyeol split up all those years ago, as far as Sungjong knows—but the night of the party was his first time actually meeting him.

"This is Dongwoo hyung," Myungsoo introduced him, grinning, all dimples and moon-speck eyes. Sungjong wasn't sure what he had expected, but it wasn't someone like Dongwoo—short and sturdy, looking even more so next to Myungsoo's elegant, tall body. He had big, expressive eyes, though, and a nice smile. "Hyung, this is Sungjong. My best friend."

"Oh, Sungjong! Ahaha," Dongwoo laughed, Sungjong didn't know at what, exactly. "I've heard so much about you."

"Same here. Nice to mee—"

But Sungjong couldn't hide his surprise when instead of shaking his outstretched hand, Dongwoo reached out to smack his ass. And Myungsoo just smiled on, apparently unbothered by it.

Sungjong was about to punch the guy in the face when he saw him do the exact same thing to Sungyeol, Jiae, and pretty much everyone in sight (even a waiter who had been unlucky enough to be at the wrong place at the wrong time). It seemed that Dongwoo smacked butts the way people shake hands or hug each other. Innocently, and in a… well-meaning sort of way.

All in all, it was good that Dongwoo was so handsy. Not only did he not seem to mind acting as Myungsoo's human pillow (how Myungsoo managed to be constantly clinging to someone who was so much shorter than him was a mystery, but then again, when it came to cuddles Myungsoo had never let anything stop him), he was always touching him, too—arm draped around his waist, hand resting on the small of his back (kind of always dangerously close to Myungsoo's ass, but, well. Sungjong guessed that Dongwoo just really liked butts).

Sungjong thought it was nice that Myungsoo had finally found someone who didn't shy away from his displays of affection, who could love him back with the same intensity.

 

 

 

 

And yet…

… There was something else that hadn't changed, still.

Sungjong realised it as he glanced their way, some time during that night, and saw them together. Sungyeol was talking about something, Myungsoo listening intently. Looking at him with the same old single-minded intensity, like Dongwoo wasn't even there, next to him.

Sungjong doesn't think anyone noticed as he slipped out and left the party early.

 

 

 

❄ ❄ ❄

 

 

 

Sungjong showed up on Myungsoo's doorstep, earlier this evening, bags of groceries in his hands. "Seriously, don't you even have rice?" he asked as he handed Myungsoo the bag of rice he had asked him to get for him. "Or soy sauce?"

Myungsoo shook his head. "I eat at Dongwoo hyung's, usually. I only have instant ramyun. And snacks."

Myungsoo's ineptitude at cooking was painfully obvious.

"Hyung, can you wash the rice while I cut the vegetables?" Sungjong asked him once they had set everything up in the kitchen.

Myungsoo simply looked back at him, blankly. "… Wash the rice."

"Yeah." Sungjong blinked. "Wait, don't tell me you don't even know how to do that?"

Myungsoo shrugged. Smiled sheepishly. "Dongwoo hyung always does everything, so… "

In the end, Sungjong asked Myungsoo to do the most simple things he could think of—wash the vegetables, peel the potatoes—while he chopped everything up. He didn't trust Myungsoo's clumsy hands with a knife; he wouldn't have been surprised if he managed to cut himself with a mere potato peeler, even.

They were chatting at first, light and easy, but they fell silent as they worked. It was a comfortable silence, though. No matter how little they hung out these days, Sungjong was always taken aback by the sense of intimacy he still felt around Myungsoo, something he could never quite reproduce with people he hadn't known all his life.

Sungjong was just thinking about that as he dealed with a particularly hard, stubborn potato that refused to be diced properly, when Myungsoo said it.

"So… "

"Mh?" Sungjong hummed distractedly, all his attention focused on the pressure of the knife on the potato, ready to go down and slice.

"… So… How long has it been?"

"How long has what been?"

"… How long have you liked Sungyeol?"

Sungjong blinked. Before he could stop it the knife was already coming down, cutting perfectly through the potato and across the palm of Sungjong's hand.

 

 

 

 

Sungjong looks down at his hand, now, the white of the bandages a blur in the dark.

The car is still silent as Myungsoo drives. Yet it's a buzzing kind of silence, one that lets Sungjong know Myungsoo still has something to say.

He knows all too well what it is. And as much as he does _not_ want to talk about it, as much as he wants to push him and everything related to that time in his life away forever, Sungjong knows that he can't. He's already run away long enough.

He closes his eyes.

"… You can say it, you know."

"Really?" There's a touch of amusement in Myungsoo's voice. "So you are not going to hurt yourself again if I talk about it?"

"… It's not like I did it on purpose."

"I know," Myungsoo says, softly, and Sungjong feels bad for snapping at him. "Still, I … I shouldn't have said it. Not like that. I didn't mean to startle you—"

"I know, hyung. It's OK. It's not your fault."

There's silence again, for a short while.

"… So it's true, isn't it? You… you like him. Sungyeol."

Sungjong doesn't say anything. He stares at the road ahead, dark and unwelcoming, until it turns into a blur.

"… I'm sorry, hyung."

Sungjong can feel the wetness in his eyes spill and trickle down his cheeks.

… Fuck.

"Jongie—"

But Sungjong turns away from him. He hates crying. It's ugly, and embarrassing. It makes him look weak, which Sungjong doesn't want to be. Which he knows all too well he isn't.

He hears Myungsoo sigh. And then he is pulling over, stopping the car at the side of the road.

"Jongie… " Myungsoo reaches out to grasp Sungjong's hand. Sungjong surprises even himself with how eagerly he clasps it back, like a lifeline. "… You have nothing to apologise for, you know. If anything… I should be the one apologising."

"Hyung… that's not—"

"No, it's true. I—I was an idiot. I really didn't know, you know? It was going on for so long, and I… I was so blind, so… stupid. Looking back now, it was obvious all along. I just saw what I wanted to see, I guess. " He turns to look at Sungjong. "Why didn't you say anything? I wouldn't have gotten in your way, you know. If you'd only told me you liked each other—"

But that was exactly why Sungjong (and Sungyeol, too, he suspects) never breathed a word of it to him. It was because they both knew that Myungsoo was too good—Sungyeol's words, _too pure,_ come back to him now—that he would set his own feelings aside so that they could be together, even if it broke his own heart.

"Well... it's not like I was completely oblivious, you know. There were a few times when I thought, maybe—things that made me suspect it. I probably knew it all along, on some level. But it was only the other day… when I saw you guys at the party—it all just clicked together, somehow. Everything finally made sense. It should have been you two all along. They way you talk, they way you look at each other—"

Sungjong scoffs, the words spilling out before he can stop them. "You're one to talk, hyung."

He feels Myungsoo's eyes on him.

"You think I didn't notice? I saw the way you look at Sungyeol, too." Like no one else is in the room. "You still love him, don't you?"

Myungsoo is quiet for a moment. "… I do. I love him," he says, and Sungjong's stomach sinks. "I always have, and I always will, I guess. You know, Sungyeol was my first friend, my first—well, everything. He will always have a special place in my life. But—

But, it's not that kind of love anymore. Maybe… maybe it never was."

Sungjong blinks.

What… ?

"I guess it would be too easy to say that I never loved him, now. I can't say that for sure. But I'm not so sure it was actually love, either. Sungyeol was all I knew at the time, and I—you know how I am, right? Once I like something, I only like that. I don't bother with anything else, even though… I might actually end up liking it better." Myungsoo pauses. "And you know, for someone like me… Love and friendship—of course they're different, but—the way I love my friends and the way I love Dongwoo, there's not much difference in intensity. It's the same with you, you know. They're both as important to me.

So looking back now… comparing the way I feel about Dongwoo, now, and what I felt for Sungyeol… I'm not all that sure it was love. Maybe … Maybe I misunderstood my own feelings all along.

Anyway—Sungyeol never loved me. That much is clear. It's always been. All those years we were together—it just didn't work, you know? We were never meant to be a couple. That's a fact. It should have been you… It should _be_ you."

Sungjong shakes his head. "Hyung… "

"I mean it, Sungjong. You guys should really talk—"

"I don't know, I… It's been so long… "

"Yeah, maybe," Myungsoo says. "But you still love him, don't you?"

Sungjong is silent as he looks stubbornly out of the window.

"Then what makes you think he won't still be in love with you, too?"

 

 

 

 

Sungjong's eyes have, thankfully, dried up by the time Myungsoo pulls over in front of the familiar sight of Sungjong's flat. He switches off the engine and then they just sit there, in silence, for a while.

"… So that was Jiae's girlfriend, huh?" Myungsoo says in the end. "Back at the hospital."

"Yeah… something like that." Sungjong can't help but think of how much Jiae would be horrified by the word. _Temporary encumbrance,_ she always corrects him when Sungjong tries to use it, but The Idiot has been temporary for months now, longer than most of Jiae's conquests have, and Sungjong is pretty sure she's here to stay. At least for the time being.

"Well, she's very nice," Myungsoo continues, "and—she… she's quite pretty—"

Sungjong smirks. "… But? Let me guess. Kind of overwhelming?"

"Well—yeah, I guess. I just, I was surprised. I wouldn't have made that out to be Jiae's type, to be honest."

Sungjong laughs. "I don't think Jiae knows that's her type, either."

"Well... I guess it's true what they say—opposites attract, and all that stuff."

"Indeed."

Eventually, Sungjong turns around to look at Myungsoo, now that he's decent enough to show his face again. "I guess I'll be going then, hyung."

"Mh. Take care of your hand, uh?"

"Yeah." Sungjong lingers, hesitating. "Hyung… I just—thank you, you know—"

"No," Myungsoo says, smiling. "Thank you, Sungjong. For everything."

And as they look at each other, Sungjong is struck by how different Myungsoo is now—still his childhood friend, but also … firmer. Stronger. But maybe Myungsoo has always been like this; maybe he was always stronger than he, than Sungyeol gave him credit for. Maybe they had been too caught up in trying to protect him to realise that Myungsoo didn't need to be protected, after all, that he could handle the truth well enough, no matter how much it might have hurt him.

The realisation brings a certain sadness, too. It makes Sungjong realise that just like Myungsoo isn't the same anymore, so everything else, too, has changed. Once three always three, Sungyeol said once, yet they aren't three anymore. They haven't been for a long time.

Sungjong feels the tears well up in his eyes again at the thought, but he blinks them away. He reaches out to hug Myungsoo instead, warm and tight, hiding his face in the crook of Myungsoo's neck.

"Jongie?"

Myungsoo's voice makes Sungjong stop just as he's about to climb out the car. He turns around to face him. "What?"

Myungsoo is looking back at him with a strange, thoughtful expression on his face—like he's studying him, like there's something he wants to say. But then he just blinks and smiles, the dimply warm smile that's so _Myungsoo_ it makes Sungjong's chest ache.

"Nothing, just—be happy, Sungjongie, OK?"

 

 

 

❄ ❄ ❄

 

 

 

Sungjong's flat is usually dark and quiet when he comes back home, but there's a light filtering from under the door now. Sungjong isn't even surprised. He knows who it is even before he sees the pair of shoes that aren't his thrown carelessly in the entrance.

Sungyeol is fumbling with something on the kitchen counter, his back to him, when Sungjong walks in.

"I see you've made yourself quite at home."

Sungyeol stops whatever he's doing for a moment to throw Sungjong a quick, suspicious look over his shoulder. "Why aren't you surprised? Myungsoo spilled the beans, didn't he."

"No. But he wasn't exactly subtle, either."

Sungyeol lets out a long-suffering sigh. "When was he ever?"

Sungjong leans back against the wall as he takes Sungyeol in—long legs and slim hips and _there,_ in his kitchen. Unreal.

"… So what, were you going to barge into Myungsoo's flat while we were making dinner?"

"Yeah, that was the plan. But then someone had to slice his hand open and ruin everything."

Sungjong wonders why everyone is acting like he did it on purpose or something. "How'd you get in?"

"The key under the mat."

"… Sungyeol, my door has an electronic lock. There's no key."

"Well, I'm actually a genius and I managed to hack through the system." Silence. "Yeah, OK, I asked Jiae! There."

 _Jiae?_ Is everyone in on this, or what?

"Imagine my surprise when she told me the passcode was 27-13-03."

Sungjong goes still. If he tries hard enough he can still hear it, Sungyeol's voice as they argued about their secret code, all those years ago, how he kept insisting that his birthdate should come first "because I'm older".

"You might be the oldest, alright," Sungjong snapped at him, piqued by Sungyeol's pettiness, "But you act like the youngest."

It all ended in a scuffle, of course; Sungyeol didn't let Sungjong hear the end of it for days, and so he finally had his way after all, as always. 27-13-03 it was, 27 proudly first.

"I just got used to using it as my password, that's all," Sungjong says now.

"Sure," Sungyeol says. "Your cat loves me, by the way."

"She loves everyone who will pet her. Or feed her."

A big fat lie: Jureumi is the most ill-tempered cat Sungjong has ever had the misfortune to meet. She tolerates Sungjong, since he feeds her and gives her a roof on her head, but she despises pretty much everybody else, no exceptions. Jiae has stopped coming around the flat because Jureumi kept glaring at her, trying to bite her or scratch at her ankles; she even hissed at Myungsoo that one time he stopped by, much to Sungjong's bafflement, because how could anybody _dislike_ Myungsoo? How did that work, exactly? Sungjong almost regrets picking her up from the shelter, if he didn't strongly believe that with her ugly looks and mean spirit, no one else would have.

Yet now she's huddled on the counter next to Sungyeol, staying obediently still as her eyes follow his every move like he's some sort of huge, live, endlessly fascinating cat treat. That's the best comparison Sungjong can think of, since the only time he's seen Jureumi look at anything like that is when he was dangling a piece of cat food in front of her.

It seems that at least on one thing, his and Jureumi's tastes match.

"Anyway," Sungjong tries to look over Sungyeol's shoulder, "What is it that you're making over there?"

Sungyeol hunches his shoulders, as if to block Sungjong's view. "It's a secret."

"Well, your secret is taking forever."

"Geez, just be patient, OK? It's coming along."

Sungjong gazes at Sungyeol's back as he bustles around.

"OK," he says eventually, "But just so you know, I have frozen pizza in my freezer. Just in case you change your mind and don't feel like cooking anymore."

Sungyeol goes still. He turns around to face Sungjong, a grin on his face. "I fucking love you, Lee Sungjong."

 

 

 

 

And so pizza it is. They eat it on the couch, Jureumi curled up on Sungyeol's lap (Sungjong doesn't want to stretch it, but he could swear she's actually _purring)._ It's incredible how easy, how comfortable it is, despite the fact that they haven't seen each other, haven't even been in the same room for years. Sungjong often finds himself almost choking on his pizza as he laughs at something dumb Sungyeol said; nevermind his princely good looks, Sungyeol is just as much of an idiot as he's always been.

Sungjong washes the dishes afterwards, Sungyeol hovering behind him, still talking ("Shouldn't I do it? Your hand—" "No, it's fine. You already cooked." "I just heated the thing up in the microwave. Hardly cooking." "Well, still. I don't mind." "Wow, what a gentleman," and Sungjong actually has to fight back a blush at that, damn it). Then Sungjong suggests they make tea.

"Alright," Sungyeol says as they wait for the water to boil inside the kettle, "So are we just going to have tea like two old ladies, or are we actually going to talk about it?"

Sungjong stiffens. "Talk about what?"

The change in Sungyeol's stance is obvious, and so sudden it almost startles Sungjong. He straightens up, body taut with anger, the same anger that's flashing in his eyes as he looks at Sungjong. "So is this how it's going to be? Because if it is, I… I'm not staying. I'm tired—I'm fucking tired of this farce. It's been going on for way too long—"

"I didn't say I don't want to talk," Sungjong says levelly. "I said, _what about?"_

Sungyeol looks at him. They hold each other's gaze for a long moment, as if they're challenging each other to look away first. Eventually Sungyeol does. He licks his lips, looks like he's going to say something, but "Just—wait a second." He turns around and makes for the front door, "There's something I need to give to you first."

 

 

 

When he comes back he has his closed fist held out in front of him, and he's smiling.

"What is it?" Sungjong asks, half-suspicious, half-expectant.

"Not so fast," Sungyeol chides him. "Give me your hand. And close your eyes."

"What, both at the same time, or one and then the other?" Sungjong asks innocently, just because every chance to mess with Sungyeol is too good to be wasted.

"Both at the sam—ah, why do I even bother with you?" Sungyeol sighs as Sungjong grins at him. He brushes his palm against Sungjong's eyes, holds his wrist gently. "Just do what I say for once, OK?"

Like I haven't been doing that my whole life, Sungjong thinks as he closes his eyes and opens his hand, showing the palm.

He stays like that for a while, silence only broken by the sound of his and Sungyeol's breathing. Until Sungyeol speaks again.

"You can open your eyes now."

"What? But—"

"Just open them."

Sungjong does. And indeed, there it is— something waiting for him in the palm of his hand, something so small and light Sungjong hadn't even felt it as Sungyeol dropped it.

Sungjong brings his hand closer to his face, to take a better look at it, and freezes.

 

 

 

It's a lucky charm— _that_ lucky charm, pink and sparkly just as Sungjong remembers it. Now, though, Sungjong notices things he never has before, like how the shade of pink is brighter than he thought, or how one of the beads the charm is made of has tiny pieces of glitter stuck to it, to make it twinkle. He realises this is the first time he looks at it like this, out in the open, and not hidden in the dark of his palm, between curled fingers.

He tries to speak, but his throat is dry, and he has to fight against the lump.

"Why… ?"

He looks up at Sungyeol.

"Why do you still have this… ?"

Sungyeol just look back at him, face blank. "What do you think, Sungjong?"

_You should give it to the person you like, and your love will come true—_

"But… why are you giving this to me? Why _now?"_

"Because—" Sungyeol looks away, runs a hand through his hair. "Because I'm an idiot. I'm sorry. I should have given it to you a long time ago. It's yours, anyway… It's always been yours."

 

 

 

Sungjong doesn't know how it happens. But suddenly Sungyeol is there, right in font of him, his face and body and lips so close, Sungjong could easily lean in and kiss him. When Sungyeol does just that, Sungjong lets him. He closes his eyes, and kisses him back.

Sungyeol's lips melt against his, pulling and stroking and teasing, like they've been doing this forever. Sungyeol is panting when they pull apart, eyes closed and forehead pressed against Sungjong's. Sungjong looks at him, at the perfect curve of his nose and lips and cheeks, his hands finally resting on the hips he likes so much as he keeps him close. It's amazing, how perfectly they fit against each other. Like they were made for this.

There's a tear trickling down Sungyeol's cheek. Sungjong brushes it away, kisses the wet spot under Sungyeol's eye. Sungyeol lets out a laugh, but it's stifled and raw, like a sob, and Sungjong kisses him again.

A kiss melts into another, and it's only when Sungyeol starts trailing kisses along his jaw, down his neck, that Sungjong snaps out of it. "Sungyeol—"

"What," Sungyeol mumbles in between kisses.

"Just… wait a second—"

Sungyeol stops. He looks up at Sungjong, sharply, but there's something almost pleading in his eyes.

"Sungjong… Haven't we waited long enough?"

 

 

 

 ❄ ❄ ❄

 

 

 

"What are you smiling at?"

Sungyeol glances up at him, snorts, but he's still smiling. "You're smiling too, you idiot."

Sungjong leans in and kisses him just to shut him up. It's true, of course. They've both been grinning like idiots, lying snugly under Sungjong's thickest duvet, because it's cold as fuck. Sungyeol's back is pressed against his stomach, smooth and warm; he grasped Sungjong's hand as soon as it was over (like Sungjong would disappear if he didn't) intertwining their fingers and pressing them against his chest, and hasn't let go since. Sungjong can't help but feel like everything has finally fallen into place, gone back to the way it's supposed to be.

He's propping himself up on one elbow, braving the cold only so that he can gaze down at Sungyeol, beautiful and naked and spent. Sungjong himself is tired—thanks to him. He didn't expect Sungyeol to just lie down and take it like the guys he usually fucks, but—wow. Sungyeol's stamina is something else.

Sungjong keeps tracing the moles scattered all over Sungyeol's skin with his eyes (or at least those on the little skin that emerges from under the duvet; the moles are literally _everywhere,_ as Sungjong has found out) and with his lips and tongue too, sometimes, kisses that turn just as easily into bites, if only because Sungyeol's skin is too smooth, too tempting not to. The sounds Sungyeol makes, sweet breathy whimpers every time Sungjong's teeth sink into his flesh, only egg him on.

Sungyeol moaned a bit too high before, kind of like a pained whimper. Sungjong immediately pulled away, worried that he'd bit down too hard, but Sungyeol just looked at him with big, accusing eyes. "Why did you stop?"

"Sorry, I… I thought I'd hurt you—"

"You didn't. You're not hurting me—I like it. I like it a lot. Please don't stop."

Well. Sungjong didn't need to be asked twice.

"Did Myungsoo give you the crap talk, too?"

Sungjong stops just as he's about to lean in and take another taste. "What?"

"That's Myungsoo being his usual self-sacrificing idiot self and pretending he's OK with something for other people's sake," Sungyeol clarifies. "He's quite a pro at that."

Self-sacrificing idiot. Sungjong tries not smile at the familiar word. "Yeah… I think he did."

"He told me he didn't love me, you know… that he never did. What a load of bullshit."

Sungjong realises that Myungsoo has given Sungyeol the easy version, that one that will make him feel less guitly about this, in the long run. And he's not going to change that. "Well, only Myungsoo knows how he really felt, I guess."

A scoff. "If he didn't love me he certainly was making a good enough show of it."

Sungjong leans in to kiss his frown away, just because. Sungyeol immediately turns around and captures his lips into a kiss. He's smiling again when they pull apart; brings their clasped hands to his lips and kisses the back of Sungjong's, softy. Sungyeol, the guys who hates cheesy stuff, who used to make gagging noises whenever they saw a couple as much as holding hands.

He snuggles back into Sungjong's chest with a sigh.

"Ah… how long has it been?"

"Mh?"

"Since that day in the library. Do you remember… ?"

Oh. Of course. "I don't know… ten years?" Sungjong blinks. "No, wait—it's almost _twenty_ years now." Incredible.

"Twenty years… " Sungyeol is stroking his fingers, pressing soft kisses against them as he speaks. It sends warm shivers down Sungjong's body, doesn't help him focus, but it's still better than before, when Sungyeol kept sucking the fingers right into his mouth, making a lot of ridiculously obscene noises just to rile Sungjong up, until Sungjong snapped at him to stop being an idiot. Mostly because it was actually working. "Why did it take us so long? We could have done this a long time ago… It could have been this good… "

"I don't know," Sungjong says. They could have. If Myungsoo hadn't been in the picture, that is. And Sungjong doesn't even want to _think_ about him not being there.

And that's when it hits him, chest filling with relief. They might not be three anymore, and things might never be the same between them ever again, but Myungsoo is still there with them, in a way. He always will be, probably.

"You know…" Sungyeol's voice reaches him, soft. "I do love Myungsoo. I really do. But… It's different. It's not like this. It's not like it is with you—" he rolls onto his back to look at Sungjong. "This is what I want."

Sungjong leans in to kiss him, deep and slow, Sungyeol's lips moving so perfectly against his. But when they pull apart Sungyeol is still looking up at him, eyes big and clear and… expectant?

Sungjong laughs as he finally _gets_ it. "Are you looking for a confession or something?"

But Sungyeol isn't laughing. "Maybe I am," he says, expression serious like Sungjong has very rarely seen it.

Sungjong stares.

 _... It's not like you told me you love me, either,_ he thinks, but he still leans in and kisses him again, Sungyeol kissing him right back.

"Sungyeol—I can tell you I love you a thousand times, if you want me to," although it's embarrassing, and I'd rather not, "But if you haven't realised it yet… Then I really don't know how to drill it into this thick head of yours."

Sungyeol is still gazing up at him, expression unreadable. It's almost unnerving, like he is weighing him up, or something. But Sungjong guesses he must have passed the test, because the next thing he knows Sungyeol is pulling him in, for yet another kiss. "Maybe… you just need to show me more," he murmurs, lips brushing against Sungjong's.

Sungjong _looks_ at him. "… You aren't tired?"

"Nope."

"But… we already—"

"Come on," Sungyeol smirks, guiding Sungjong's hand, "this sexy ass could do with some more pounding."

Sungjong is laughing even as he cringes. He can't believe Sunngyeol actually _said_ that—although, why not? This is Sungyeol. "What, this little thing?" and he squeezes, because it's a _cute_ little ass. Not that he's going to admit it to Sungyeol any time soon.

"Yeah. The little thing you seemed to like so much while you were sticking your—"

_"Sungyeol—"_

"What? It's true!"

"Aaaah, my god—you… you're too much! Don't you ever shut up?"

"If you want me to shut up, give me a _good_ reason to."

Sungjong complies, all too readily.

(In a corner of the room, a tiny lucky charm glimmers.)

 

 

 

❄ ❄ ❄

 

 

 

It's dark and quiet, probably the middle of the night. But Sungyeol notices right away when Sungjong starts stirring, his warmth leaving him as he tries to disentangle their bodies, gently. Not enough for Sungyeol's sharp senses, though.

"Where are you going?" He says, clutching his arm.

"To the grocery store," Sungjong says, the little shit. "Where do you think? I need to use the bathroom." He groans as Sungyeol tries to drag him back to bed. "Ah, seriously, I can't even pee in peace with you—"

But he doesn't put up much of a fight when Sungyeol pulls him on top of him. Gives Sungyeol all the kisses he wants, and then some. He whispers sweet nothings into his ear, words that that make Sungyeol shiver, make him hold on to Sungjong even tighter (he tries to impress them in his mind, if only so that he can tease Sungjong about them tomorrow morning, because of course Sungyeol would).

"Don't be long," he admonishes when Sungjong has finally coaxed him into letting go.

"Yeah, yeah. Your wish is my command, prince Sungyeol."

Sungyeol listens as Sungjong's steps get farther and farther away, as the door closes quietly behind him. And then he waits.

He's not really worried, though. Well, not too much. Not anymore.

He knows, now, that Sungjong will always come back to him, anyway.

 

❄

 

**Author's Note:**

> The title is a line from Sonata Arctica's _The Misery._
> 
> 27 - 13 - 03 are, respectively, Sungyeol, Myungsoo and Sungjong's days of birth, in order of age.


End file.
